He Had Once Been
by Always-Striving
Summary: He has a conscience and he has a heart, but sometimes he wishes otherwise. It would make things so much easier. Because no matter what the past held, it will always be impossible to hate his father, even now with him passed. Edited 6.14.13


As a Fire Lord, there are more important things to worry about.

As a father, there are more important things to worry about.

As a man, there are more important things to worry about.

But that's logic against emotion—two things that can never come together.

"My Lord, are you alright? Did you hear what I just said? The Earth King's demand is impossible to allow! Our countrymen will never be able to return if..."

"Dad? Dad, did you hear me? Kya invited me to a sleepover in Republic City next week! Can I go?"

"Zuko, you're not listening again! Is this just because my sword was always better than yours? Jeez, you've got such an inferiority complex, live a little! Quit sulking so much!"

Three months. Three months have passed since the death of Fire Lord Ozai—a tyrant, a monster, but (and) a father. Three months have passed since life stopped making sense. Zuko is supposed to be happy, relieved that the world's biggest threat to peace finally died out after fifteen years in prison. He is supposed to be, but he isn't. Just confused. Confused and trying to run away from his father's ghost.

Even after death, the demons haven't left him.

And Ozai's voice still chills him to the bone.

He's gotten much better at facades since he was sixteen. It isn't hard at all now to slip that flawless mask of balanced neutrality on his face after years of being on the throne. Expectantly, keeping his pulse normal for Toph-proof measures was much harder, but his family has always been notorious for manipulating appearances. Granted, at sixteen (young, foolish, and so dangerously outspoken), he would have never been able to manage such a feat. But that was beside the point.

The point is, no one can tell he's drowning. And it's better that way. To let anyone know how much that voice gnaws at him, how much those memories hiss at him, how much that face follows him—is completely out of the question. The Fire Lord has always had to stay aloof and untouched to be a good leader, and more than that, he doesn't want to worry anyone.

But that doesn't stop the demons.

_"You will learn respect, and __suffering__ will be your teacher."_ The Agni Kai.

_"You will obey me, or this defiant breath will be your last!"_ The solar eclipse.

_"I see the new Fire Lord has come to visit me in my lowly prison cell..."_ The coronation day.

Remembering his cold, cruel voice; remembering his spiteful, loathing eyes; remembering his hateful, cutting words—it's all he can do to keep from hating Ozai. It's all too easy to give in, all to easy just to give up and hate him. But that is not the kind of man he wants to be, not the kind of man he wants his daughter to see him as, and that was not the kind of ruler he wants to become. There is no doubt in his mind that all those things that his father desired and craved is nothing more than an endless pit and a ruthless cycle.

Or at least, that's what he keeps telling himself.

_"My brother is many things, Prince Zuko, but he wasn't always like this. I believe that Ozai saw himself in you, and that has always been the root of why he was never willing to give you a chance."_

Uncle is right, as always. Ozai hadn't always been like that: he hadn't always been the malicious megalomaniac the rest of the world was so used to seeing. Somewhere, deep inside his memories, Zuko knows this. He knows there had once been a proud, happy father who would have never said any of the things his son heard so bitterly and constantly in his dreams. He knows there had once been a man whom he had adored—one with a fierce gleam in his eyes and a deep, bellowing laugh.

_"Daddy! Daddy! I found shells! But one's got a big, red bug in it, see? What is it, Daddy?"_

_"That isn't a bug Zuko, it's a crab. Crabs look like bugs, but they're really more like fish and like to live in big shells like that one. You should put it down before it pinches you."_

_"It can't pinch me, Daddy, I'm big!"_

_"Yes, you are getting bigger Zuko, but you don't want to get pinched by a crab."_

_"Why not?"_

_"Because, its claws are very sharp."_

_"Awww!"_

But that man of deep, bellowing laughs is gone now, and so too are those days of big, red bugs... Those memories have always been so bittersweet, and always cause his heart to throb both of pain and of warmth.

There was not much of his father left in the world, not of the man Zuko had known has a child. Only the flames he had once commanded in the throne room; only the children whom he had loved, then pressured, then broken; only the dark legacy that would never be straightened out to the world. Not his thoughts, not his story, not his tragedy—nothing.

Zuko sighs.

"I'll behave during the meeting, Dad, I promise."

His own daughter is twelve years old now, twelve years old and about to attend her first council meeting. She looks at him with that same bright eagerness he had at her age, that same thirst to be a good heir to the throne, that same desire for approval—he manages to keep the sadness out of his voice.

"I know you will."

Once they're in the council chamber, he settles himself onto the wide dais, bringing the wall of fire to life with a small flick of the wrist. As usual, there's a steady hum of discussion from the participants; he hardly pays it any mind and only keeps half an ear on the conversation, opting instead to drift off into his own thoughts. Looking around, Zuko is struck the irony of the scene before him: his eyes fell upon his daughter—back straight, shoulders back, hands folded, so befitting of the princess—and he can't help but flash back to his first meeting here.

A surge of anger suddenly flares in his throat—the plan, the duel, the punishment—the wall of fire scorching the high ceiling in the process and causing the industrial minister who'd been relaying the status of some such statistic to freeze and drop into a trembling bow, offering his most sincere apologies. Zuko mutters something about it not being his fault and getting sidetracked before scowling, trying to control himself but unable to bring his attention back to diplomatic matters.

Why _can't_ he hate his father? Why _can't_ he hate Ozai? For what he did to one small family, if nothing else. After all, wasn't he the reason the family was in shambles? Wife gone and erased from the world, daughter destroyed and lost in her own shattered mind, son burdened and scarred by the struggles of twenty men...it was him who'd done it all. It was _his fault. His fault!_ So why is it so hard to hate him?

_"Because you're a sentimental fool."_

Zuko adjourns the meeting early, claiming to have important calls to make and intent on going outside and getting some air. There's a feeble hope that it might help clear his head, but he doesn't really believe it will do much. He just has to _get away._

Standing outside in the wide open air, staring at the rushing water of the small creek in front of him, there's an ever-present frustration creeping up at his fingertips. He had long ago accepted that the struggle between Roku and Sozin—the struggle within his own spirit—would always be a part of his life. But that doesn't make it any easier. He knows he is a "sentimental fool", but he has always known that. He has a conscience and he has a heart, but sometimes he wishes otherwise. It would make things so much easier.

But...

_"Stand and __fight__, Prince Zuko!" _His first Agni Kai.

_"You have redeemed yourself, my son." _His first day home.

_"Do you think adding more troops will stop these rebellions?" _His first day useful.

No matter what the past held, it will always be impossible to hate his father.

Perhaps that is why his death would always haunt his son. Why this vicious cycle—another cycle—will continue.


End file.
